Hey,

Ive been doing a good bit of welding today. ran one tank out and then I slapped another one on there. The gauges and the gold colored regulator deal are all wet with persparation.

What does this mean? What am I doing wrong?

This happened once before to me and if I remember right the bottle ran out. :mad: Dont wanna do this again!!!!

MUCHOS GRACIAS!!!

Also, my welds are pourus like there is a lack of gas. The gauge reads that the tank has plenty of stuff in it though:confused:

(Can you tell that I am a profesional welder by my use fo technical terms... the gold thing.... plenty of stuff:D :D :D )

I can't offer any useful info other than the "gold thing" is actually Brass and it's called a regulator :flipoff2: :usa:

I blew out the diaphram in my regulator once and had the same problem. You might want to see if you can find someone with a good reg and give it a shot. Listen carefully and see if you can hear any leaks coming from the regulator. If not shut down properly (as in, turn the pressure down to zero and vent the gas in the lines) the you can damage the reg pretty easily.

How much welding were you doing and at what flow rate? How bad was the condensation on the reg? A little bit isn't a big deal if you have been using the tanks for a while, but if you are dripping then I'd have it checked.

It was dripping almost. Definatly not normal. Thing is that it did this before and since then I have been thoguh several tanks with no problems...

I think my flow rate was abot 15 or so. What is it supposed to be at for general purpse welding?

Thanks!

Sounds like you are running too much gas through the regulator. Should be about 10lbs Someone correct me if I'm wrong here can't seem to remember the correct setting.

on your holey welds. you welding in the wind? thatl blow your gass away.

Ty,

If you're welding with those big-ass fans on in the garage, there's no chance in hell of getting a good weld.

Also, I imagine that, if you're using the bottle of gas that we keep outside, or even the one in the garage, the gas inside coming out is a lot hotter than the cooler air outside, much less the cool air blowing on it if you have those industrial fans on. I imagine that the temp difference between the gas passing through the regulator and the outside moving air could create some good condensation.

J. J.

Ar and CO2 are both cooling gasses but if its real humid out your gauges will sweat due to the pressure difference...sounds like a flow problem to me...at 15 that's fairly low.....

Hmmm, sounds like your gas is hauling ass out of the bottle,are you sure the regulator guage is reading properly?
Sounds like the regulator is blown to me, I run mine at about 25-30lbs and have no condensation at 65% humidity.

Flow should be at +/- 15 bar, turn it up to 18 bar if you are welding dirty or galvanized steel.
If your flow is too high that will also result in porous welds, this could be your problem.

The regulator usually get wet when you have high pressure running through it, at my job we had old plumbing and a lot of leaks in the "weldmix" lines. The lines were also getting wet and then even started to freeze.
So you probably have a leak somewhere, you should be able to hear it tough.
If it was me i'd get myself a new regulator.

Christof

I listened for leaks, nothing that I can hear. I dont have those fans blowing JJ, I know better than that. Another thing that my welds are doing is when I stop welding, a little nipple (hehe) grows out of it. Kinda like one of those firecracker things that you do and they grow. It does that. Just kinda spurts out maybe 3-4 milimeters, maybe that will help tell yall what my problem is.

Anyway, I took the regulator off and retightened. Well see what that does.

Thanks again for the help!

Originally posted by TyTy
Another thing that my welds are doing is when I stop welding, a little nipple (hehe) grows out of it. Kinda like one of those firecracker things that you do and they grow. It does that. Just kinda spurts out maybe 3-4 milimeters, maybe that will help tell yall what my problem is.


Sounds like the gas isn't making it to the tip for sure then,did you check to see if the holes in the tip are pluged?
You wouldn't have porosity or nipples;) if it was getting gas to the tip.
and maybe the condensation is from the gas being backed up:confused:
also check the connection where the gas line enters the stinger the tube could have blown off from being plugged at one time or another.

Yeah. This happens to me all the time with our welder. The gas line that goes into the back of the welder gets pushed up against the gas canister from moving the welder around. It gets pinched and no gas gets through. Make sure that that isn't happening.

J. J.

I completely forgot about that Payotee! I did the same thing when I built the new cart for my welder. The welder sits at an angle and had slid too far back against the plate that supports the tank. The gas line pinched and almost no C25 was getting to the weld. As I recall, the reg was getting a bit condensed as well.

sounds like the regulator :nuke: or you pinched your sleeve, or gas ports in the tip are plugged. or you are welding to stuff you just cut w/ a torch then didn't grind.

Originally posted by Josh 89XJ
I completely forgot about that Payotee! I did the same thing when I built the new cart for my welder. The welder sits at an angle and had slid too far back against the plate that supports the tank. The gas line pinched and almost no C25 was getting to the weld. As I recall, the reg was getting a bit condensed as well.

Yeah, ours is angled backwards, too. How annoying. We bought ours. Why would they build them like that anyway?!?!?

J. J.

Hey, TyTy...this has nothing to do with your welder problem, but when you were lookin for tube in GA/AL, where did ya'll find it the cheapest? I'm ordering a bender tommorrow:D

Originally posted by ryanwhit
Hey, TyTy...this has nothing to do with your welder problem, but when you were lookin for tube in GA/AL, where did ya'll find it the cheapest? I'm ordering a bender tommorrow:D

We ended up getting it from a friend of mine who works at an industrial machine shop. We only paid wholesale prices! Just got a shipment in the other day, in fact. If you have a way of transporting it to your place, you might be able to get in on the next order with us. It would be delivered here in Athens, GA. PM me if interrested.

J. J.

patooyee, I made mine like that because it is very low to the ground and if it were level it is hard to read the settings or adjust them. I wanted the cart as small as possible so it was easy to move around the shop (a bit cluttered) and kept a small, low footprint. I solved my pinched tube problem by just welding a tiny stop behind the welder and it hasn't happened since.

Hey yall!

After taking all these comments into consideration I replaced the tip, took off and put the regulator back on, and made sure the line wasnt ubstructed (it was a little pinches) and I am back to getting good welds...

Thanks for the help!